


B-A-N-A-N-A

by hoosierbitch



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Angst, Awkward Romance, Developing Relationships, Five Times, Gen, General Leia Organa is Queen, Hurt/Comfort, Mourning, Multi, Other, PTSD, Poe needs hugs, Poe!Whump, Snarky Droids, Terrible Jokes, Torture, fatigue, friendships, late night drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-16
Updated: 2016-01-29
Packaged: 2018-05-14 08:27:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 11,669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5736646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hoosierbitch/pseuds/hoosierbitch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five sleepless nights in the life of Poe Dameron: hotshot pilot, professional hand-holder, droid rescuer, hopeless romantic, and accidental insomniac.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. K-N-O-C-K  K-N-O-C-K

**Author's Note:**

> Endless thanks to my favorite humans, shadowen and alfador, for capslock squealing with me about Poe and his hair, for encouraging me to keep working, and for betaing the final product, 
> 
> They are amazing.

_ one. k-n-o-c-k k-n-o-c-k. _

<Poe.>

He was cold.

<Poe, respond. Poe, respond. Poe. Poe. Poe.>

His leg was—his leg—he blinked and saw blackness. Blinked again and saw specks of light. Passed out thinking they were stars.

<Poe! Alert! Poe!>

Woke up and realized they were actually stars. He was in the cockpit. His leg—oh, gods.

<Poe. Pilot. Pilot. Poepilotpoepilotpoepoepoepoepoe—>

“BB-8?”

The beeping sound he’d been hearing increased in a flurry. “Too loud,” he whispered. His throat was dry and his mouth tasted like blood. “What happened?”

<Collision. Enemy ships destroyed. X-Wing sustained damage. Poe sustained damage. BB-8 is perfect in every way.>

Poe laughed, then gasped when the movement shifted his leg. He didn’t want to look directly at it, but he knew better than to ignore it.

He could see clearly enough what had happened. There was piece of metal--a strip they’d welded on to patch up the ship’s interior after the last retrofit--that had twisted. The patch job wasn’t designed for the possibility that the entire side of the cockpit would be bowed inwards. Poe was grateful that the hull hadn’t been punctured, but. But the end of the piece of metal had pierced his flight suit and was embedded in his thigh, its other end still welded to the cockpit.

It was less than ideal.

Through the right viewport he could see the foils of his X-Wing, still extended for the fight, crumpled and folding back in towards the ship. Apparently, ramming into a TIE fighter to knock it off course wasn’t an approved battle maneuver. 

“It worked, right?” Poe asked. He didn’t want to die for nothing.

<Poe saved the day!> BB-8 said, ending with a trumpet-like fanfare.

“Thanks, buddy. Are you really okay?”

<Affirmative.>

Worse, though, even worse than the interior of the ship intersecting with the interior of his body, was the fact that the dashboard was completely dark. Some systems had to still be functioning, because he was still breathing, he was cold but not frozen, and his eyeballs hadn’t popped out of his head into the vacuum of space. He could hear BB-8, although that might be an auditory hallucination.

“Are you broadcasting an SOS signal?” he whispered. His throat hurt, as if he’d been screaming. “Is anyone nearby?”

BB-8 warbled, sad and low.

“Oh. Well—hey. This isn’t so bad, is it? Me, you, the stars.” He tried to turn, to see BB-8 and so that BB-8 could see him and be less lonely. He moved, but the metal in his thigh didn’t. He passed out screaming.

<Please? Poe. Please?>

He blinked and realized the constellations had changed. He felt cold, except for his right calf and ankle, where he could feel the hot trickle of blood.

<I need you.>

“BB-8?”

An excited burble, whistles, and then a string of phrases too fast for him to track. His mind wasn’t working right. Blood loss, low oxygen levels, possible concussion—he had a lot of excuses to choose from. “BB-8, slow down. I can’t understand you.” Another soft, apologetic warble.

The communication lines between pilot and droid were the most insulated part of the starfighter. Not every pilot had the same kind of relationship with their droid that Poe had (okay, no other pilot; he and BB-8 were maybe a little co-dependent), but all of them knew that, when their ship took off, it was just them, their astromech, and space. Being with BB-8 was worlds better than being alone.

BB-8 hummed to itself for a while, then, slowly, began spelling out strings of letters in basic binary. <K-N-O-C-K  K-N-O-C-K.> Poe tried to get his mind to work. BB-8 wasn’t making sense. <Poe. Poe, respond. POE!> A piercing whine split through the cockpit, shocking him into wakefulness.

“Sorry. Sorry, what--what did you say?”

<K-N-O-C-K  K-N-O-C-K. Poe, respond.>

Poe smiled. “Who’s there?”

<B-A-N-A-N-A.>

He felt himself relax, listening to BB-8’s careful letters and self-satisfied chortles. “Banana who?”

<K-N-O-C-K  K-N-O-C-K. Poe, respond.>

“I thought I already—did I pass out?”

<No. K-N-O-C-K  K-N-O-C-K. Poe, respond.>

He sighed, which shifted his weight on the seat. He clenched his fists against the pain. He wished he could move. He wished he could get that metal _ out _ of him, wished that someone could would carry him out of this cockpit and let him lie down. Maybe that’s what heaven would be like. 

“Who’s there, BB-8?”

<B-A-N-A-N-A.>

“Banana who?” The droid burbled happily. At least, if Poe was going to die out here, he’d die with a smile on his face, having made someone else happy.

<K-N-O-C-K  K-N-O-C-K. Poe, respond.>

“I have a feeling I already know the answer, but, okay: BB-8, who’s there?”

<O-R-A-N-G-E.> He was going to die, in an X-Wing that had turned into more of a B-Wing, all the ends turned back in on itself, laughing at the stupidest joke ever told.

“Orange who?”

<O-R-A-N-G-E   Y-O-U   G-L-A-D   I   D-I-D-N-T   S-P-E-L-L   B-A-N-A-N-A?>

“Yes, B,” he agreed, trying not to move when he laughed. “I’m very glad you didn’t spell banana. But I think that—that joke—” A wash of pain. Numbness spreading up from his hip. He couldn’t feel the blood spilling down his leg anymore. “It loses something,” he gasped, “in translation.”

BB-8 hummed thoughtfully. Then, <A   L-O-N-G   T-I-M-E   A-G-O   I-N   A   G-A-L-A-X-Y   F-A-R   F-A-R   A-W-A-Y   T-H-E-R-E   W-A-S   A   M-A-N   F-R-O-M   N-A-N-T-U-C-K-E-T>

His radio crackled.

<H-E   H-A-D   A   H-O-L-E   I-N   H-I-S   B-U-C-K-E-T>

Jessica Pava’s voice, more static than words, came in through his helmet’s comm. "I was going to rescue you, but now I want to know more about this man from planet Nantucket.”

“It’s a long story,” Poe gasped. “But I’m pretty sure it ends with ‘Fuck it.’”

BB-8 laughed as Pava’s X-Wing came into view in front of them. She waggled her X-Wing’s foils, then flashed him a thumbs-up when she got closer. “We’ve got another ship on the way, Dameron,” she said. “You’re going to be just fine.”

After that, instead of S-O-S, Black Squadron sent out B-A-N-A-N-A-N-A-N-A signals, and refused to explain why.


	2. Forest Fires Back Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Poe would say this for the First Order: they sure did know how to torture a guy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I put more specific content warnings in the end note. If you need more information, please feel free to contact me here or [on my tumblr](http://hoosierbitch.tumblr.com/)!

_two. forest fires back home._

Poe would say this for the First Order: they sure did know how to torture a guy.

It was clinical, methodical, and terrifying. The room was isolated, noises muffled, and he felt deafened by the sound of his own breathing, the scrape of sharp tools on a metal tray, and always the same question: “Where is the map?”

“I’m not going to tell you.” He tried to meet his tormentor's eyes, but it didn’t really work, since the other person was wearing a mask, and Poe was seeing double. Or—no, there were actually two of them.

Even better.

“Where is the map?”

“It’s in Emperor Palpatine’s summer home,” he said, licking his lips, cracked and bleeding.

“What?”

“It’s a lovely place. Beaches, surfing, whale-riding—he was a big fan of dolphins, old Emperor Pal. Did you know that?”

He got a punch to the stomach for his troubles. Aside from this, and the first few blows, they’ve avoided visible damage. Drugs and pressure-point manipulation can go a long way.

Then the third Trooper—or the second one, blurrier, moving too fast, Poe couldn’t track them—dealt him a blow to the diaphragm. Poe fell forward, gasping for air, the restraints cutting into his skin.

“Where is the map?” Another blow. He still couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t talk even if he wanted to. And, Force help him, part of him wanted to. There wasn’t going to be a rescue mission. The best case scenario would be to die before they could get important information from him. BB-8 had the map, and would bring it back to the General.

Then something sharp, pressing against the base of his pinky finger. “Do you really need all your limbs intact in order to pilot a Starfighter? Shall we find out?” He had hoped for a better death than this. “If you tell us, we’ll let you go.”

“No, you won’t.” He didn’t think he’d been screaming, but his voice was hoarse.

“We’ll send you back,” the Trooper said. “Mostly in one piece. Don’t you want to go home? Don’t you want to live?”

Yes. Yes, he wanted to go home, to climb the trees around his family’s house, to tell his grandma thank you one more time, he wanted to beat Wedge Antilles’ flight record and take an X-Wing through the Kessel run. He wanted to fall in love.

But a village had died for that map. They’d died because Poe had been followed, died because Poe didn’t surrender, died in front of him because he hadn’t run fast enough.

Giving up now wasn’t an option.

“Don’t worry,” the Trooper said. “We’ll make it easier for you to be honest with us.”

They injected him with something that slid through his body and invaded his mind. Within heartbeats his senses were distorted: it turned the room into a tunnel, his tormentors into monsters, and his skin into raw nerves. There was poison in his veins.

They shocked him until he passed out, then shocked him until he woke back up. They used a stunner, a long black stick that branched into three points. Its use had been banned from the federation over a century ago.

He clenched his teeth so tight that he thought they would shatter, an explosion of white shards and blood and flesh, the only answer he had to give them.

When he couldn’t hold himself up anymore, and simply sagged against the rigid bonds, they put the stunner aside and started on his hands. They slid something under one of his fingernails, something sharp that split his skin and travelled past the nail bed, bumping against his knuckles, reaching the edge of his palm.

When they started to pull it back out he left his body. There wasn’t enough room for him there.

The trees on Yavin 4 were always green. The first time he spent a turn of the seasons on a different planet, he was convinced the planet was dying. The trees caught fire and withered in brilliant colors, then dropped their leaves and stood reaching desperately for a sun that wasn’t there. Spring had come like an overdue prayer, and every breath he took felt like his first.

They started on the next finger.

It wouldn’t kill him.

It felt like it was killing him.

And then silence. No more metal inside his body. The sounds of armor and respirators fading.

“I had no idea we had the best pilot in the Resistance on board.” Kylo Ren’s voice sent jolts of fear down Poe’s spine. “Comfortable?” This man had given the order to kill a village of innocents. This man was powerful enough to hold an energy blast in mid-air, hungry and restrained.

“I’m not telling you anything,” he said, the words heavy and mangled in his mouth. He was drowning in the nightmare they had made of his body

The man in the mask laughed. And then he reached into Poe’s mind and twisted it.

Poe choked on blood and sand.

Blood and stars burst inside his eyes.

"Poe Dameron.”

The trees of Yavin 4 were on fire, orange and red among the leaves.

“I thought you’d be stronger than this.” There was something almost familiar in the pain tearing him apart. Something lost and good, like sweet candy on a hot day, laughter drifting on a dry breeze.

He wasn’t strong.

Pain stole his breath and tightened the muscles of his body until they felt like they would snap, splitting at the seams, leaving behind bones.

He had been beaten before. He had lost fights and crashed ships and broken limbs. He knew pain.

This was something else.

He could hear BB-8, a soft whining sound, pained and soft. He needed to go to BB-8, to help, to save—

“There it is,” said Kylo Ren, in a soft, familiar tone that crawled under Poe’s skin. When he managed to open his eyes again, he realized how close the man was standing. He was exquisitely aware of the fact that he couldn’t feel the man’s breath on his neck.

Then his vision blurred, body jolting against the chair like an X-Wing on takeoff. He should ask BB-8 what the hell was wrong with the cockpit, some condensation or fog in the way? Something was wrong.

“Your little rescue droid,” Kylo Ren whispered, words that Poe only heard in his mind, winding through him like a snake. “Were you really so lonely that you built yourself a friend?”

The words, laced with jealousy and hate, burned through his mind like meteors through metal, ripping vital pieces to shreds. He knew now that the whistling sound he heard was his own breath, but if he tried hard enough, he could imagine it was something else: BB-8, back when its body was dented and grey; BB-8, flying for the first time, lighting up the dash like fireworks; BB-8 learning how to whistle—BB-8 whistling a warning—the First Order was coming, they had to get off-planet, Poe had to save—

“Your droid has the map.”

The fog in his mind evaporated. Once again he was locked in a grey room, no trees or fire or sand, no old friends, no allies. Kylo Ren sounded pleased, distorted voice gentled with approval. “They shouldn’t let you get out of the cockpit, Dameron. You’re no good on the ground.” He waved an idle hand and Poe caught fire, flames licking up his legs and crawling over his skin.

He had failed.

And the man who had beaten him was Ben Organa.

“No good on the ground,” Poe whispered. Ben had teased him mercilessly when Poe first joined the Resistance, following Poe around like an awkward, gangly shadow, teasing and admiring and shy. ‘Best man in the air, worst man on the ground,’ Ben would say. It had felt more like a tease than an insult at the time.

Ben hadn’t died in Kylo Ren’s attack. He’d been behind it.

Poe gasped for air with a body that couldn’t move, screamed with rage that he couldn’t fuel, begged with words that he didn’t know.

He had failed. Now he was going die.

Then Ben touched his face, his fingers gentle on the bloody curve of Poe’s jaw, his glove slick against Poe’s split lip. “I always knew you were weak.”

When he left, all of the fight left Poe. This was not how he wanted to die.

When the war came to the moon of Yavin 4, it wrecked entire forests. Some came back, new trees growing through turrets and missile casings, vines wrapped around metal skeletons. Others, poisoned by fuel, scarred too deep in the earth, stayed barren. Graveyards for Star Destroyers littered his world, and he grew up playing on TIE fighters like jungle gyms.

A village had burned because of Poe.

Now the resistance, and General Organa’s hope of finding Luke Skywalker, would die because of him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Content Warning** : This scene covers the torture Poe went through. There is physical torture (with physical blows, electricity, and fingernail-specific-pain). Kylo Ren's mental attack is also very invasive and unwelcome. If I have missed any warnings or tags, please let me know!


	3. Daydreamers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I, uh—I don’t know if I’d say I’m the best pilot in the Resistance,” Poe said, ducking his head, focusing on something safe. “But I’m definitely the best X-Wing pilot still flying. And with a bit more practice, I think I could pretty good with TIEs.” He shrugged, then added, "I also fart rainbows and can spontaneously produce puppies, if the rumors are to be believed." His squad did their best to make sure his head didn't get so big it couldn't fit into his helmet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you alfadorcat and shadowen for the beta! <3

_three. daydreamers._

Once the thrum of adrenaline slowed and the base returned to some semblance of calm, Poe went to see Finn. He’d tried to stop by earlier, but he’d been called to Command. Rescue operations were underway for stranded ships, and there had been some hope that any captured Stormtroopers might be swayed to join their side, given Finn’s experience. But they’d all either committed suicide or been shot by a superior officer instead of surrendering.

BB-8 had hacked into the medalert system and kept Poe updated on the operations.

He still needed to see Finn alive and breathing.

The surgery had gone well, and they’d put him in the same room Poe had spent the night in after his return from Jakku. There was a woman he hadn’t met before sitting at Finn’s bedside. She was wearing sand-colored clothing, layers on layers, a style he recognized from his recent time on Jakku. She was younger than he’d expected, given the stories that were circulating. But it had to be Rey; D’Qar wasn’t a big base, and he knew everyone else on it.

He stopped in the doorway, half in, half out. “Sorry—am I intruding?”

Rey shook her head. “No. Do you need to run more tests?” Poe had to look down at himself before he realized he’d changed out of his orange flight uniform into something a bit fancier, a light tan color, not too far off what the medics wore.

“I’m not a doctor,” he said. “I’m just came by to see how Finn was doing. I’m Poe? Poe—”

“Dameron,” she interrupted, standing up and smiling at him. Suddenly, she looked like a different (much friendlier) person. “You’re BB-8’s human! You gave Finn your jacket. They told me a lot about you.”

Poe found himself blushing, Rey’s smile having completely transformed her face into something joyful and happy and beautiful. It was overwhelming, having that attention focused on him. “I hope BB-8 didn’t spread too many lies about me.”

“Oh, I’m sure it did. I just don’t know which ones are lies and which ones are the truth.” She held out her hand, and he grasped it for a firm shake. There were calluses on her palms and fingers. He wondered what she’d done before running into Finn and Han Solo, before she left to become a Jedi.

“Is it true that you’re the best pilot in the resistance?” she asked. Poe was used to hearing a bit of hero-worship when meeting new people (his legend was much bigger than his life). But Kylo Ren had said almost those exact same words. They echoed to him now, and it made him flinch away from her.

Rey’s smile faded. If she was a Jedi, maybe she could feel what he was feeling. Maybe she could feel Kylo Ren on him, see how he'd touched Poe, see what he'd done—

“I, uh—I don’t know if I’d say I’m the best pilot in the Resistance,” Poe said, ducking his head, focusing on something safe. “But I’m definitely the best X-Wing pilot still flying. And with a bit more practice, I think I could pretty good with TIEs.” He shrugged, then added, "I also fart rainbows and can spontaneously produce puppies, if the rumors are to be believed." His squad did their best to make sure his head didn't get so big it couldn't fit into his helmet.

She laughed, startled. It was a lovely sound. "You really did save Finn though," she said. "And you were nice to him. The first person to be nice to him. None of that is a rumor.” She was looking at him so curiously, like she didn’t understand why Poe didn’t think he was as great as Finn thought he was. It was odd, and also nice, to receive praise just for being nice, not for being really good at flying and killing people.

"Finn saved _me_ ," he clarified. He's been correcting that misconception a lot lately. "I owe him my life."

"Me too,” Rey said, looking back down at Finn. “There’s another chair,” she said, pointing at one tucked away in the corner. “Do you want to stay a while?”

He was too tired to think up a good excuse, but he couldn’t let himself stay. He didn’t want to intrude. “No, I—”

BB-8, finally done fangirling over R2-D2 (at least for the time being), wobbled into the room and started chirping happily when it saw Rey. Rey smiled and crouched down to say hello. She moved stiffly; Finn wasn’t the only one who took some hits during their last fight.

“Hi, BB-8! I missed you.” She ran her hands over his outer casing, checking for damage. Poe had already done the same thing, but he completely understood the need. “How’s the antenna?”

BB-8 turned its head towards Poe and warbled lovingly.

“What was that?” Rey asked. “I know binary, but something BB-8 makes these…”

“It makes sounds,” Poe finished. “There was a glitch in its communication programming. I’d just gotten it, and there were other repairs that were more urgent, so in the meantime I had someone code a subprogram, and I taught BB a bunch of sounds. Then it started experimenting, picking new sounds, trying them out—”

BB-8 made a fart noise.

“Some were more successful than others,” Poe said dryly.

“That’s wonderful,” Rey said, standing back up and giving BB-8 one last pat on the head. “Do you really have to leave?”

<Negative,> said BB-8, the traitor. 

“I got called to a meeting,” Poe tried. 

<Meeting cancelled.> Poe glared at BB-8, who wiggled at him and then rolled under Finn’s bed and made another fart sound. Rey was very obviously trying very hard not to laugh at him. 

“I guess I can stay,” he said. “Just for a little.” 

They made small talk for a bit, but it was like dancing in a minefield. Trying to talk about their families or their pasts made Rey shut down. Poe, who had very recently been marooned on Jakku and left for dead, didn’t really feel like talking about where she grew up, either.

“Is it true you flew the Falcon?” he asked. 

Rey’s eyes lit up. “Yes—but at first, I didn’t know it  _ was _ the Falcon. I thought it was an old junker.” They talked for nearly an hour about the ship, which Poe had lusted after as a kid. He’d been so mad when Han gambled it away before Poe had bargained his way into the pilot seat.

At that point one of Finn’s monitors gave a loud beep. They both jumped and stared at it, then looked at Finn. He looked the same. He looked dead. A droid came in long enough to look at the readings and tell them that everything was normal. Everything was the same.

They were quiet after that. Finn suddenly seemed like more of a presence in the room. A silent conversation partner instead of just a conversation starter.

“You didn’t know him long though, right?” Rey asked. 

“I guess not,” Poe said, feeling kind of stung. He’d known Finn for…minutes. A handful of scattered minutes; if he let go they would blow away. “It was really—it was just two times. Neither were very long. I know that you two had more…”

“That’s not what I meant,” Rey said hastily, leaning forward. “He just… He has this effect on people? I didn’t know him for very long either, but I feel like I’ve known him for a lifetime. He just…” She stopped. It seemed like she didn’t know any words for what she was trying to say. 

“He’s Finn,” Poe agreed. “He’s special.” 

Rey met his gaze, relieved that he had found the words, and nodded. They stayed there through the night; sometimes in awkward silence, sometimes talking about ships they wanted to pilot, places they wanted to go. Sometimes talking about Finn, which felt like they were remembering a shared dream: vivid and real and impossible in the light of day.

Rey got called away before Poe did. “I’ll stay,” he promised her. “As long as I can.” 

“I might be a while.” 

“I know.” He’d seen the star map too. He’d heard about Rey wielding Luke's lightsaber. It made sense that she would be the one to go. “Hey, if you want to check your flight plans before you go, I’d be happy to take another look at the map. It’s an unknown system, so—I mean, I know you don’t  _ need _ my help, but just, if you want it. I’d be happy to.”

She graced him with another sunlight smile. “Thanks, Poe. I’ll take you up on that.” He sternly told himself that he didn’t shiver when she said his name. She turned to Finn to say goodbye. “I’ll stop by again before I leave. I promise.”

After she left, BB-8 rolled to the door and warbled sadly down the hallway. 

“You can follow her if you want to, buddy,” Poe said. “I’m—I’ll probably just catch a nap in here for a minute.” He was so tired, so sore, so utterly spent, that he wasn’t sure he’d be able to stand up. “Go on.”

BB-8 rolled back over and rested against Poe’s leg before starting to purr. 

Poe smiled and put a hand on BB-8’s dome, touching the antenna that Rey had fixed. He matched his breathing to Finn’s, slow and steady, and almost managed to fall asleep. Kylo Ren’s voice whispered at the edges of his mind. When he closed his eyes, a black-gloved hand came closer to his face.

So he just watched Finn—Finn, the impossible, shared dream—and waited for morning.


	4. After the Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> While the others celebrate Kylo Ren's defeat, Poe seeks out Leia. Before Ben fell, he was her son. And now, there is no one left to mourn him.

_four. after the storm._

Poe searched the base for more than an hour before he found her. He hadn’t thought to check the command center, since technically, it was closed. Rescue efforts were over, there were no ongoing missions that needed standby support, and everyone had been ordered to take a goddamn break. 

But that’s where she was. General Organa, alone at her command table. None of the holos were activated, but it still gave off a dim, steady light. 

He watched silently for a few seconds to make sure she wasn’t crying (if she was, he would leave) and also to make sure she was breathing (she was, thank god, he'd failed his last med recertification and if he had to do CPR he’d probably kill both of them). 

"General?" 

She turned quickly to look at him. He’d barely seen her since the fleet returned, and he’d expected her to look more tired. Worn-down. Older. But her hair was perfect, and her smile was real, and the spark in her eyes was bright. According to Mae, her aide, she hadn't left the control room for more than two hours since the battle started. That was three days ago. 

Something was wrong.

"Poe," she said, reaching out a hand. When he took it, she squeezed it gently and then let go. Unexpectedly, he felt stung with childish rejection. Whenever they weren’t standing on ceremony, Leia would hug him, or kiss his forehead, or pinch his cheeks and complain that he was too skinny. She only treated him like a coworker when they were actually working.

Since his first day as a member of the resistance, Leia—who had been a councilor then, though everyone was still calling her princess—had kept an eye on him. She used to tell him he would do great things, and mediocre things, and terrible things—as every person should—and she wanted to be there to see it all. She remembered all his birthdays. And now, she could barely touch him. He couldn’t blame her.

She cleared her throat, shaking herself awake. "What can I do for you, Commander?" 

He had some tape from the last battle that he wanted to go over with her—the TIE fighters were using new maneuvers, and Poe needed approval to get new X-Wing flight simulations built—but that was an excuse, it wasn’t the reason.

"I heard about Han."

Her smile got tight. "Most people have." 

"And I heard that it was because of Ben." It felt wrong to call him that. It felt wrong that Ben Organa put on a mask and chose a new name and became Kylo Ren, a man who could torture a friend and enjoy it, a man who could kill his own father. 

"It wasn't Ben," Leia insisted hotly. "And that is classified information." 

"Finn told me, but, in his defense, he was really high on painkillers at the time. They won’t even let him move yet. But I explained what 'classified' means. And I left BB-8 there to poke him if he forgets again.”

"You always think of everything,” she said, leaning back in her seat. She was wrong, though. He hadn't thought about Leia. Not enough. Not until her aide had pulled him aside and said she was worried. Everyone on D’Qar loved Leia, and respected her, and would try to give her some time to herself. Poe, who knew just how alone Leia was now, thought she might appreciate some company.

"Leia, if Ben didn't kill Han, what does that—I thought Kylo Ren…?"

"My son Ben is dead," Leia said simply, like it was just one more bullet point on the agenda of their conversation. "Kylo Ren is the man who killed him. They just happen to share the same body." 

Poe didn’t understand. How were you supposed to think of someone like that? To look at someone's face and see both a monster and a beloved ghost? How can you mourn someone with a living body? 

They didn't have Han's body either though. It had been on Starkiller Base when the reactor blew. 

"Is there going to be a funeral?"

"The memorial ceremony is tomorrow. I hope you didn't forget about that, Commander, as you are scheduled to deliver the opening speech." 

"I didn't forget, no. And I know Han's going to be commemorated. But..."

"But what?"

"What about Ben?" he asked. Leia’s face went totally blank. "With all due respect, ma'am—"

"If you're going to be disrespectful, don't preface it with a lie, and do _not_ call me ma'am, Dameron." 

He ducked his head and nodded. His spine stiffened automatically, back straight, shoulders square. This wasn't Leia and Poe anymore. He should have done what everyone else did, and respected her solitude. "My apologies. I—I shouldn't have—I'll leave." 

She was still looking at him with a cold, challenging expression when he sketched a short bow and turned to leave. Walking away felt physically painful. He didn't like to leave people alone when they were hurting. He didn't like that he'd brought her more pain. Not to Leia, his leader and commander, the woman they all trusted and loved. Not to Leia, who brought him tea when he was laid up in medical, and sent dirty jokes to his PADD during mission briefings. Not to Leia, who had been waiting on the tarmac when Poe got back from his first successful mission, ready to celebrate, and ready, later, to hold him when the realization that he hadn't just beaten a simulation, he had _killed people,_ finally sunk in.

"No one would come," Leia said. Poe stopped moving when he heard her. He was almost to the door, but the room was empty, and her quiet voice was clear. "If I hold a funeral for Ben, I would be the only mourner. And I'm already mourning him, Poe. I mourn him every second. I've been mourning him for years." The expression on her face now matched what he had expected to see earlier. The weight of that much waiting. In her eyes, creased but not wet with tears, he saw what those years had stolen and wasted and done to her. "What good would it do?" 

"I don't know," Poe admitted. Most people still didn't know that Ben hadn't been a victim of Kylo Ren's attack on the Jedi in training, he had been the perpetrator. He didn’t know what finding out would do to morale. 

Poe walked back over when Leia gestured at another chair at the table. 

They spent a lot of time in silence. It wasn't the comfortable kind. 

Poe was exhausted, but whenever he found himself about to nod off, he'd hear Kylo Ren's voice, a wordless whisper inside his head, and he’d be shocked back into full wakefulness. 

Leia just sat, staring at the dark maps in front of her, completely still. Whatever war she was fighting, it wasn't one that Poe was a player in. 

"Do you—" He licked his lips, dry with nerves, and continued. "Do you remember when we had that base on Soltra?" 

"Yes," she said, her forehead wrinkling. "That was a long time ago." 

"There was a swimming pool right on the edge of camp. And Ben—he was such a skinny little kid—he'd sneak out there every day." 

"You were with him, more often than not," Leia said, finally looking at Poe instead of the enemies in her mind. "And that was not a pool, it was a cesspit."

"We went almost every day. And I got this terrible sunburn—"

"You looked like a broiled tomato." 

"—and Ben got some weird gel that he swore would make it stop hurting. And instead, it turned me blue. For weeks." 

"He felt so bad," Leia said. She was smiling now. Not a big one, but a real one. "He'd made it based on suggestions from Chewie and C-3PO. And just mixed everything together." 

"Still, it was a really good summer." 

She nodded her agreement and then went still again. Poe went back to staring at his own scarred hands, remembering when they were smaller, smoother, and light blue. 

It felt like he and Leia were the only people left on base. In actuality, everyone else was just in the hangar bay, celebrating the victory. Everyone would be there, they needed to be there. They needed to reconnect, to see the faces that were still there, to laugh and dance and fuck and believe.

"Ben broke his arm when he was four," Leia said. Poe startled badly at the noise and hit his knee on the table. “He was doing some—some silly stunt—I can't even remember what it was. He jumped off something in the living room and landed badly. I was asleep upstairs, so when I wake up I hear my son screaming, Han yelling, Chewbacca roaring, and the Falcon's engines powering on." She sighed and raised an eyebrow. "Apparently, they were going to fly him to a hospital. In the Falcon. Which was half-taken apart at the time to replace a condenser. So I run in, take Ben from Han, tell him and Chewie to call for hospital transport. It only took a few minutes to get there, and they fixed him up quickly. And do you know what Ben was upset about?" 

"No," Poe said, imagining Chewie installing child-safe seatbelts in the Falcon. 

"He wasn't mad about our crazy family, he wasn't mad at the doctors, wasn't even mad at himself. He was mad at me because I wouldn't let him fly in Daddy's ship." 

"Ouch," Poe said. 

"He was always like that, though. He'd focus on what was important to him, and nothing else really mattered." 

It had been sweet when he was a child. When he wanted to swim in forbidden pools or fly with his dad. It wasn't such a good quality anymore. "You know what I just remembered?" 

"You left the oven on?" 

"I don't have an oven, because someone didn't assign me quarters with a kitchenette." 

"You don't have an oven because a very wise woman didn't want you to burn the entire planet down while trying to make coffee in the morning." 

"One time," Poe said, shaking his head regretfully. "A person accidentally sets himself on fire _one time_ , and they never let you forget it." 

"Damn right." Her smile was wide and wicked, and he laughed when he met her eyes. "But you were going to say something.” 

"I _was_ going to bring up that phase he went through where he wouldn’t brush his hair, but I was so rudely interrupted. Princesses these days," Poe said. "No manners at all." 

"Princesses have manners. Generals have armies. Which would you rather have?" 

He thought about it for a minute. "I'd like a princess and a general. That way, I can be rude and mean and start fights, and they'd clean up after me." 

"The day that you are rude to someone is the day I join the First Order," she said drily. 

"I can be rude! I opened a door without knocking yesterday. I mean, it was a mistake, since I thought the room was empty, but it was still rude." 

"Poe, Poe, Poe. What am I going to do with you?" 

"Get drunk with me?" he suggested. "If we switch to coffee around 5am, we should be sober in time for the ceremony. We're probably going to be the only sober ones there, actually." 

"I wasn't planning on being that sober," Leia added. 

"You are a rebel." 

"Until the last drop of booze is gone." 

Poe fetched drinks and snacks, and hung a sign on the door that said **_PRIVATE MEETING IN PROGRESS. DO NOT DISTURB._**

Leia was already back in the room by the time he was done. She had changed into a thick, fluffy robe, the closest she could get to pajamas while still technically counting as clothes. Poe was in a flightsuit that had been worn and washed so any times it was soft instead of stiff. It had turned a light, rusty orange, from the deep red it used to be. It was his father's. 

They spread their goods out over the strategy table and planned their attack: beer, then Auralian mead, then vodka, then a few shots of whatever the mechanics had been distilling in the corner of the hanger. 

Every drink, every shot, they told a story. Poe didn't have as many, since Ben was a few years younger than him and they hadn't met until Poe was sixteen, but more and more came to mind. He remembered how awkward Ben’s first real growth spurt had been. He remembered teaching Ben how to take apart a control panel. He remembered Ben and Leia and Han, back when they were still a family.

He was finishing up the last beer when she asked him how he was really doing. He said, "Fine." Then, always an honest drunk, he said, "No. I'm not fine. I can't sleep. I've got bruises all over, and they hurt. I have nightmares. Every time I look at my squad—and keep looking, for the people who aren't there—I want to scream, and scream, and never stop." Leia nodded. He thought that if she told him it would get better, he would start screaming. 

Instead, she pulled him in close and kissed him on the forehead. 

It made him miss his mother so badly he ached with it. 

He wondered if it made Leia think of Ben. 

He hoped it didn't make her think of Kylo Ren.

After they drained the last of the mead, Poe asked Leia if she was okay. She said no. 

He didn't ask again, and she didn't elaborate. Poe nodded, and said, "That shucking—that fucking stucks." Then he blinked and looked down at the empty cup in his hand. "This is good." 

While pouring their second shot of vodka, she asked him if he hated her. He said no. 

"But I'm his mother," she said. "I made him. I raised him. I—I couldn't stop him." He said no, and no again, and kept saying it until she stopped trying to convince him that she was at fault and the blame was well-deserved and he should hate her, really, he should, it would be okay, she hated herself already. 

They were already sitting on the floor (chairs had proved too challenging after the first round of mead) so it didn't take much to pull her into the circle of his arms. 

In the Resistance's command room, surrounded by shadows and empty chairs, they mourned: a woman who had lost both son and partner, and Poe, who knew and loved all of them. Two mourners in a shared memorial, remembering the good. They didn’t have to remember the bad. It wasn’t something they could forget. 

Leia cried for a long time. Eventually, she started hiccupping. Then Poe caught them. He jumped with surprise, knocking over an empty bottle and a chair. Leia laughed at him, and then he laughed at her, and then they were both laughing, hiccupping and laughing and bumping into chairs and table legs and each other every time they moved. The laughter was body deep, and even though they were both still crying—and hiccupping—it felt good. It felt like a sunrise. 

The next day, both Poe and Leia delivered their speeches with poise, eloquence, gravity, and heart. (They had also spent the hours beforehand puking in Leia's private bathroom and reading each other's speeches out loud to practice. Some of Poe's notecards didn't make it out entirely unscathed, so he ad-libbed more of his speech than he meant to. It worked out okay.)

* * *

He didn't know what he'd do if he saw Kylo Ren again. Didn't know if he'd see Ben, Ben who they celebrated and mourned and needed to let go. Maybe he would just see Kylo Ren’s cavernous mask, which shaped the shadows of his nightmares. Maybe, like Leia, he would be able to see both. 

It wouldn’t stop Poe from killing him. He had long outgrown the boy who cried after his first mission. He stopped keeping track of his kills years ago, since he kept placing the tally against the number of pilots he’d lost. There was no way for those numbers to be good. 

He would kill Kylo Ren for Han, for Chewie, for Rey, for Finn, for himself, and for their lost and fallen. But not for Leia. 

For Leia, he would bring the body home. He would sit with her, and talk and drink and cry and laugh, and together they would remember the boy who loved them back. Together they would do what they could to honor Ben Organa, a boy who lost his battle against the dark side.


	5. Shelter

_five. shelter._

 

It was the middle of the night when a sharp knock sounded on Poe’s door. Poe, who was already awake, scrambled off his bed and over Finn’s sleeping body. They were both fully-clothed, and Poe slept on top of the blankets, but they were still _sharing a bed_. The last time he was this sad and horny he was twelve. But Finn—used to being squeezed into barracks—couldn't sleep by himself. Since Poe couldn't sleep no matter what, he'd offered himself as a solution. (So sad. So horny.)

Rey was at the door, her hair back in a single ponytail, looking exhausted and pissed off. Poe really wanted to touch her hair, touch the creased skin between her eyes, touch her tense shoulders.

“I can’t sleep,” she said.

“Join the club.” He hadn’t slept in…he couldn’t actually remember.

“There’s a club?” She sounded like she wanted to join.

“No, it’s just a phrase. Do you want to come in?”

“No, I want to go _out_ , only the guards won’t let me.”

“What?” Finn, getting out of bed, sounded sleepy but already outraged on Rey’s behalf. “What won’t they let you do?”

Poe, realizing how bad this must look, stepped back. “Rey, Finn and I were just sleeping, we weren’t—”

“I know you weren’t doing anything,” she said, rolling her eyes. “Finn told me already. He sleeps better around other people. We tried it, but I can’t fall asleep with somebody that close to me.”

“Oh,” Poe said, nodding, trying to catch up.

“I want to go off-base for the night. I need to sleep,” she said, with an undercurrent of desperation that tugged at Poe’s heart. “There are so many people here—even without all my Force training making everybody’s thoughts buzz at me, it's too loud. On Jakku, it was….”

“It was really peaceful there at night,” Poe said. Rey looked surprised, then remembered that Poe and Finn had crash-landed at the same time, but Poe hadn’t gotten off-planet as quickly. He’d spent a two full nights and days there, covered in sunburn, shivering in the desert cold, trying not to think about how many people he’d let down that day.

“Do you have to get special permission to go?” Finn asked. “Who would you even ask? The General? Skywalker? The command structure here is so _weird_.”

“They just said I can’t go _alone_ ,” Rey interrupted. She stared down at her own feet. “I’m sorry for waking you both up. But. Will you come with me?” Poe shuffled back a bit more to give Finn some room.

“Of course we will,” Finn said, with a broad smile that included both Rey and Poe.

“No, you guys go,” Poe insisted. “That way you can—” He wasn’t going to actually _tell_ them to make out, because he wasn’t a masochist, but he also wasn’t going to get in their way. He wasn’t a sadist either. “It’ll be quieter if there’s only two people there,” he reasoned. “That’s what you need to sleep, right?”

Rey’s forehead crinkled unhappily, but it was Finn who actually found an objection. “But I won’t be able to sleep unless I’m right next to someone. And that keeps Rey awake.”

“So we’ll all go,” Rey said, with a huge smile. She and Finn both turned to Poe. “Can we use your blankets?”

“And pillows?”

“Sure,” Poe said, not sure what he had done so terribly wrong in a previous life to deserve this. Kicked an ewok? Gone over to the dark side? Punched a kitten? “Sounds great.”

* * *

It didn’t take them long. They reached the edge of the base and showed their IDs to the guard on perimeter duty. Rey and Poe had grabbed flashlights, and Rey led the way while Finn, and then Poe, followed. She led them to a clearing about a twenty-minute walk away.

They spread out Poe’s blankets (which were going to get dirt and grass stains on them, and smell like the outdoors and Rey and Finn—he was going to have to burn them if he ever wanted to sleep without having wet dreams).

When they laid down, Rey took one edge of the blanket, and Finn the other. Poe, without any better options, lay down between them. He tried to give Rey some space, but the blanket just wasn’t that big.

“Is this okay?” Poe asked.

“It’s better,” Rey said. Poe shut his flashlight off and waited for his eyes to adjust. Rey looked ethereal, the moonlight dancing over her face, the leaves overhead making new shadows with every breeze.

Finn already had his eyes closed. There was a peaceful smile on his face that Poe hadn’t seen before. He actually started leaning towards Finn—how was he supposed to look at those lips and not kiss them?—before he caught himself.

“I grew up in trees,” Poe said, trying to get his mind back on track. The trees here weren’t the right kind—not tall enough, strong enough, old enough. But it reminded him of home.

“That…is a joke,” Rey said, glancing at him to see whether she was right or not. She was still getting the hang of humor that wasn’t at her expense.

“Kind of. When I was a kid, I explored anything I could find. But mostly, I stayed in this one tree by my house. I ate up there, read up there, pretended I was an X-Wing pilot. I didn’t know until a lot later that the tree had been a present from Luke Skywalker.”

Rey pushed herself up on one elbow. “You know Luke?”

“No—I never met him, but my parents both served with him. He gave the tree to my mom after some mission that she won’t tell me about.” He understood the urge to shield your loved ones from dark, unpleasant things. He also understood that shields weren’t that different from walls. When he was younger, there were things his parents wouldn’t talk to him about. Now, there were things he wished he could talk about, but he just…he didn’t know how.

“Was it a special tree?” Finn asked. He rolled onto his side, chest pressed against Poe’s shoulder, so he could see Rey better.

“Was it a Force tree?” Rey asked.

“Probably,” Poe said. “It always felt…safe. Being in a cockpit makes me feel alive—it’s my favorite place to be—but it’s not really a place to…” He half-shrugged, and on either side of him he felt a warm body press closer.

“It’s not home,” Rey said quietly. “Can we—do people ever find that again?” She sounded sad. Sad, and oddly hopeful.

Finn reached out a hand and touched Rey’s cheek, a gentle, careful gesture. He brushed his thumb over her cheekbone, tracing the line a tear would follow, and Rey leaned into his touch.

It was odd, Poe thought, odd how tender Finn was. How vulnerable Rey could let herself be.

And what was he doing here? Why was he getting between these impossibly strong, achingly beautiful people?

Rey and Finn were still touching, still looking at each other, so Poe tried to wriggle out from underneath. They moved back, and he got to his feet.

“Poe, are you okay?” Rey asked.

“Fine,” he said, picking up his jacket and casually holding it in front of him (his body had been a bit too interested in the proceedings). “I just remembered there’s something I need to do.”

“At this time of night?” Finn asked curiously.

Rey started to stand up too, but Poe waved her away. “You guys should stay. Enjoy your night.”

“But we can’t sleep without you,” Finn said. He looked like the loneliest, saddest puppy in the universe.

“Yes, you can,” Poe said, finding a smile somewhere and throwing it on. “This way it’ll be quiet enough for Rey, and you can still have somebody next to you. You’ll work it out. You don’t really need me.”

“Poe—” Rey reached out for him, a gesture and a feeling, pressure against his mind—

Poe’s world went black. A piercing pain in his temples. Bile choking a scream. _Where is the map?_

“Poe?” Rey’s voice was quieter now.

He stumbled back a step, then smiled, stood up straighter, and threw them a jaunty salute. “Looks like I need some sleep too. I’ll head back to my quarters once I’m finished with—with the thing I have to do.” _Smooth, Dameron._ “I’ll see you two in the morning.”

Both of them called after him, but he kept walking.

* * *

They were so young. There was so much for them to discover, and learn, and enjoy. They were well-suited to each other. Poe wished them all the best.

Really.

Since he knew he wasn’t going to be able to sleep in his bed—not when it still smelled like Finn, but would be cold and empty—he went to his X-Wing. BB-8 was already there.

<Poe did not get lucky,> BB-8 said mournfully, his head drooping with a slow whir.

“No, but Finn and Rey are definitely getting lucky. And that’s—that’s—” He let out a deep breath and looked around. There was no one else there, no one listening in on what the poster boy was saying, no curious eyes following him. He crouched, leaning forward to press his forehead against BB-8’s dome. “That really sucks, B.” He tried to laugh, but nothing came out.

BB-8 stayed perfectly still for as long as it took Poe to get moving. Then, it rolled under the X-Wing, and remotely activated the magnetic winch that pulled it into place.

“We’re not going anywhere,” Poe said. “We’re grounded until the General says otherwise. We can’t—” He was getting sick of that word.

He climbed up onto the X-Wing, pried the cockpit open as quietly as he could, and slipped inside.

It didn’t feel like home. It didn’t feel like a house full of his dad’s cooking, the Force tree that had cradled him in its branches, the small patch of earth between Finn and Rey that had, for a little bit, been his.

It felt like an extension of himself, like a prosthetic for his mind and body, a shield and a weapon.

For the first time, it felt lonely.

“Hey, BB-8. Want to hear a joke?” BB-8 burbled an elated affirmative. “Knock knock.”

<Who is there?>

“Poe.”

BB-8 sounded of a chorus of celebratory noises.

“You’re supposed to say, ‘Poe who?’”

<I know who Poe is,> said BB-8, with an exasperated raspberry sound. <Poe is best human, droid rescuer, flyer of all things.>

Poe sighed and dropped his head back against the seat. “You’re a smart-ass, you know that?”

<You made me. I am your fault.>

“You sure are. And there is nothing in the whole galaxy that I’m prouder of than you, buddy.” BB-8 made a pleased sound, then started humming. It was an old song, one that Poe didn’t remember all the words to. He hadn’t meant to teach it to BB-8; he’d just half-sung it under his breath while working on difficult projects so often that BB-8 had learned it.

He pulled his legs up onto the seat and wrapped his arms around his shins, resting his chin on one knee. He didn’t like feeling lonely. He didn’t like feeling out of place. He didn’t like feeling homesick. He hadn’t been, until Rey and Finn came along. Maybe he just hadn’t noticed it until them.

He wouldn’t get in their way. He would do everything in his power to make sure that they were happy. They deserved that.

And he’d move along, too. He’d find someone else who made his skin tingle and his heart race, someone else who smiled at him like he was a winning lotto ticket, someone else he wanted to kiss so badly that staring at their lips made him lose track of time.

“In the morning, I’m going to be a better person,” he told BB-8. “But right now, I’m just going to…” Cry, apparently. He was going to cry, hot tears from dry, tired eyes. He was going to wrap his arms around himself and pretend they were someone else’s arms, and he wasn’t alone.

“It’s okay you didn’t let me finish the joke,” he said. “I’m pretty sure Poe Dameron, alone in an X-Wing, is a pretty good punchline.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There is a plus one that I was going to include in this chapter, but it got long, so it gets its own chapter now. It's going to the betas today, so it should be done in a day or two! Thank you for your patience, I adore you all! (The next part is happy! I promise!)


	6. Rock-a-Bye BB

_plus one. rock-a-bye bb._

 

He didn’t manage to sleep in the X-Wing, he just drifted; his mind wandered down worn paths that smelled like forest and fire, where all the shadows were sharp, the sounds all echoes. He made himself start moving when BB-8, who had kept humming for much of the night, began beeping in a quiet but insistent rhythm.

“What’s wrong, B?”

<Alert! Hostile on starboard side. Has been holding position for 13 minutes.> Poe looked out the viewport to see General Organa leaning against a mechanic’s standing tool box, tapping her foot impatiently. <Agitation levels rising. Recommend evasive action.>

“No. I better go face the music.”

<We,> BB-8 corrected. <We face the music.>

Poe popped the canopy and dropped out of his X-Wing with a groan. His knees felt stiffer than a Terisian martini. When he straightened up enough to meet Leia’s eyes, he tried to smile. “Good morning, General.”

“Good morning, Poe.”

Poe remembered them standing like this before: Leia, waiting for him to get out of his X-Wing after his first combat flight. Congratulating him while herding him away from the crowds, and then—when the reality of the war and his role in it finally hit him—she’d held him, and told him there was no shame in tears, and that killing in a war did not make him a bad person. She told him that if he wanted to stop—if he didn’t want to fly for her again—that she would understand.

She had already won his respect, but that day she gained both his loyalty and his heart.

He pulled himself together and saluted. “How can I help?”

“You’re not allowed to fly,” she reminded him, with a look that could shoot down TIE fighters.

“I wasn’t flying! I just—I had a…”

<Poe did not get lucky.>

Poe turned slowly to his droid, then waited for the ground to open up and swallow him.

Leia smirked.

“This isn’t real,” Poe decided. “This is a hallucination. A Force trick. I’m dreaming.”

“You have to be asleep to dream, and from what I understand, you haven’t been doing much of that lately.”

“Yeah. I just…”

“Nightmares?”

He shrugged. Were they really nightmares if they came in the day, in the sunlight, when he was wide awake? Were they nightmares if they were mostly memories?

Leia sighed, then sat down on a nearby bench and gestured for him to join her. Sitting down was kind of painful. The stormtroopers had, more than once, kicked the backs of his knees to get him to kneel.

“When I was young,” Leia said, “I wanted a Thurm. Do you know what Thurms are?” He shook his head. “Adorable, fuzzy little animals. Big eyes. Sharp teeth. Native to Alderaan—there aren’t many left outside of zoos.”

Poe made a mental note to see if he could buy a Thurm off the black-market. Leia had a birthday coming up soon.

“My parents wouldn’t let me get one. I was—oh, five or six at the time. But I begged, and pleaded, and made many promises about how well I would take care of it.” When Ben was that age, he’d made similar arguments in his campaign to get a pot-bellied pig.

Poe, when he was seven, made friends with the family of Whisper birds that lived in the tree behind his house. He hadn’t asked permission from his parents. He never even told anyone about them. They were gold, and silent, and took seeds carefully from his fingers when he offered them, and perched on his shoulders and arms if he was still long enough.

“It’s not that I’m not enjoying the conversation,” Poe said, “but...am I missing something?”

She gave him a look—more with her eyebrows than her eyes—that shut him up. “The point, Dameron, is that when I got a Thurm, I loved it for about a week, and hated it for five months after that. It was a huge responsibility. High-maintenance, needy, demanding. The girl I gave it away to loved it. It would sit on her shoulder and pet her hair.”

“That’s…nice?”

“Now, let’s talk about the fact that I was on my way to bed after a twenty-hour work day, until I was ambushed by two very sweet, very high-maintenance, very needy, very confused animals. They spent an hour staring at me with giant, sad eyes, trying to figure out why you don’t want to be friends with them anymore.”

_Oh, bantha fodder._

“I may be a maternal figure,” Leia continued, “but I am not a yenta. If you want to do this, you have to promise to take care of them. It’ll be a lot of work. They deserve that. And if you’re not ready—if this isn’t something you want—tell them now. You owe them—and yourself—at least that much.”

“I’m so sorry, Leia. I didn’t mean to pull you into this.”

She smiled at him, then stood and beckoned him closer. She hugged him, and—like always—he was surprised that he had to bend over, surprised that she wasn’t as tall as she seemed.

“Thank you.”

She held him at arm’s length and looked him over. “You look like an utter mess, Dameron. It’s a good thing they seem to like you for your personality as much as your looks. Gods know _why_ , since you’re a giant pain in the ass.”

He hugged her again.

She smacked him on the ass as they walked out of the hanger.

* * *

He checked Finn’s quarters first, since they were closest, and found them empty. He went to Rey’s next, telling himself that if both of them were in there, he would be happy for them. He’d wish them a good morning and not think about the night before. But Rey’s quarters were empty too.

They weren’t in the mess, the command center, the hangar bay, the infirmary, the flight simulators, or the Falcon (he didn’t actually get _inside_ the Falcon, but Chewbacca was particularly emphatic about denying him entrance).

BB-8 bobbled along behind him, refusing to help, because that was Poe’s life now.

They were probably still out in the woods, cuddling on Poe’s blankets and getting the pillows dirty. There was no way Poe was going to track them out there, since he’d have to find someone to accompany him in order to get off-base. And, since he liked his sanity and reputation, he didn’t plan on explaining the situation to anyone else.

Eventually he gave up and went back to his own room.

Rey and Finn were sitting on the floor in front of his bed, leaning against each other, fast asleep. The blanket they’d brought outside was folded in Rey’s lap, and Finn was hugging two of the pillows to his chest.

Rey was snoring.

It was the cutest thing he’d ever seen.

BB-8, who still referred to Finn by his designation (the droid heartily approved of a logical naming sequence), announced:

<Poe! I have located FN-2187 and person-who-is-an-acceptable-substitute-for-short-periods-of-time-if-Poe-is-away!>

Rey woke up with a start, one flailing elbow hitting Finn in the stomach. Thankfully, Finn was protected by the pillows, and just mumbled grumpily.

“Poe.” Rey said his name gently, looking up at him like he was water after a drought, fresh fuel for a tired fire, precious and fleeting.

Finn snorted and sat bolt-upright. “Poe?” He looked around blearily, then smiled widely. “You came back.”

“Did you finish that thing you had to do?” Rey asked, standing up stiffly. They must have been waiting a long time for him, sitting on his floor, even though there was a perfectly good bed. They must not have thought they were welcome.

“What thing?”

“You said you had to do something,” Finn replied. “Then you ran away.” Poe tried to think of something to say other than ‘I went and hung out with my droid in the ship I’m not allowed to fly yet,’ but nothing came to mind. “You’re a terrible liar.”

“I didn’t—I was—I had to—”

“You’re our friend, right?” Finn said, squinting up at him from the floor. “You’re not allowed to run away when things get scary. Well—not for very long, anyway.” Finn looked at Rey when he said that. The frown on her face softened.

“We didn’t mean to upset you,” Rey continued. She was so tense, practically vibrating with energy, caught between the two of them. “We just…”

“We can’t figure you out.” Finn sounded frustrated. Poe flinched. “We tried to ask General Organa about it, since she’s a mom and she’s kind of like your mom but also she’s just really smart, and she said she’d explain it, but all she did was tell us about some rodent she didn’t want to take care of.”

“A pet,” Rey said, like it was a new word. A new concept, probably. “Poe, do you want a pet? We’ll get you a pet. We’ll help you take care of it.”

Poe, trying to latch onto something concrete, asked, “How’d you even get in here?”

“Rey convinced the door that we were cleaning staff.” Finn levered himself up off the ground and sat on the edge of the bed, one eye on Poe to make sure it was okay. Poe gave him as much of a smile as he could muster, and Finn relaxed a little.

Rey stared at her feet. “Sorry.”

“No, it’s okay—I was looking for you anyway.”

“Yeah?” They both stared at him with eager, hopeful eyes.

“What do you want from me?” His words sounded desperate. Poe wasn’t sure what they would ask for, he wasn’t sure what he had to offer them. He felt empty. Something vital had been pulled out of him, and in its place there was a hungry shadow. He was worn thin. Old.

Tired.

“We don’t want anything _from_ you,” Rey said slowly. “We just want...you.”

“We want to be _with_ you,” Finn clarified. “Nothing—nothing here makes sense,” he said, including the room, the compound, and the entire galaxy with one expansive gesture. “But some things feel right. Being with both of you feels right.” Finn’s instincts had already saved Poe’s life once. He was inclined to trust them.

“And it doesn’t matter how we are with each other,” Rey said. Her hands were flexing like she wanted to be holding a weapon, like she was afraid. “Friends, or—or lovers—whatever you want. Just...don’t leave us again.” There was a story behind those words that Rey hadn’t told him yet. Something young and scared.

“Poe,” Finn asked, “what do _you_ want from _us_?”

He wanted to go back in time and stay with them under the stars and accept what had been offered. He wanted them to be waiting on the tarmac when he landed, he wanted them flying by his side, he wanted...them. He wanted more.

“I want to kiss you,” he said, in a hoarse whisper.

They both moved forward: Rey’s hands reaching for him strong and sure, Finn confident and eager.

Suddenly BB-8 was between them, electrical prod extended. <Abort!>

Poe scrambled into a crouch, startled and worried. “What’s wrong?”

<Poe is functioning below optimal levels,> BB-8 said, beeping shrilly at Finn and Rey. <Operation Threesome should be postponed.>

Poe almost fell over backwards. “I’m functioning just fine! And since when did you give this scheme of yours a name?”

<Forty-one days ago.>

“What did it say?” Finn demanded. Then, to BB-8, “What did you say?”

BB-8 blew a raspberry at him.

“Poe,” said Rey, head cocked to the side like she was listening to someone Poe couldn’t see, “are you okay?”

Poe wanted to say yes. Yes, he was okay; yes, he was sure about this; yes, he was fine, they could leave, they should kiss him, they should never have come here.

He put a hand on BB-8’s dome. BB-8 swivelled its main optical lens to look at him. “I’m tired,” Poe confessed. It was obvious, but also embarrassing. “I haven’t slept in a while.” He didn’t mention the nightmares. He looked up at Finn, who was wearing a worried expression. Finn had said it perfectly earlier. “Nothing makes any sense. But I don’t know what feels right.” His instincts on the ground were not as trustworthy as Finn’s. After all, he had trusted Ben.

“We’ll talk about kissing again tomorrow,” Rey decided. “Or the day after. Or the day after that. We have time.” BB-8 slowly retracted its prod. “I’m really good at waiting.”

“Can we hug you?” Finn asked. Finn and Rey both looked to BB-8 for permission. BB-8 bumped into Poe until he had to stand up to keep his balance. Then it rolled itself to its charging station, burbled happily, and powered down.

It was, hands down, the best hug of Poe’s life. Rey and Finn both smelled like the forest, grass and wet earth, but Finn also smelled like Poe’s deodorant and Rey had made herself a perfume with sage and lemon and something Poe couldn’t identify.

Finn’s arms wrapped around all of them, expansive and inclusive. Rey had one hand fisted in Finn’s shirt, and one in Poe’s like she thought they were going to leave and wasn’t going to let them. Poe let his arms settle around their waists. Holding them. Being held.

“I think somebody needs to sleep.” Finn’s voice was a rumble in Poe’s ear. He realized he was leaning against Finn’s chest, and shook himself awake.

Rey’s grip on him tightened, and when he met her eyes, there was nothing he wanted to do more than kiss her. From the way she looked at his lips, she felt the same.

Finn, the most sensible of all of them, said, “Come on, I don’t want to get electrocuted in the middle of the night by our little orange chaperone. Be good.”

Eventually—with much teasing, sideways-glancing, and some blatant oogling—they got ready for bed and settled down. Finn lay between Poe and the wall, wrapped up like a happy human burrito, and was asleep within minutes. Rey made a mattress of sorts out of one of Poe’s blankets (not the one they’d brought outside, which was currently covering Poe and Finn), and was using a sheet and Finn’s jacket for a blanket.

“Aren’t you cold?” Poe whispered.

“No,” she said.

“Is it bothering you? Being close to people?”

She thought about it for a minute. “It’s not as bad when I’m with the two of you.” Poe, absurdly flattered, grinned into his pillow. “You’re both so _good_ , and _warm_ , and when we’re all together, it just—it’s like a closed circuit, no interference, no static. It’s safe.”

“Sounds nice.”

“It is. Now get some sleep, Dameron. I have big plans for tomorrow.”

He propped himself up on an elbow and blew her a kiss. She giggled, and her smile made Poe’s stomach flutter. Rey started snoring not long after that.

Poe was looking forward to a good night’s sleep.

But Rey’s snoring quickly turned from ‘cute’ to ‘who let a bantha in here?’ and Finn kicked him in the shins, then the knees, then punched him in the kidney. Poe was mostly sure Finn was asleep through all of it.

BB-8 flickered its lights from across the room, so Poe waved back a little with the arm Finn wasn’t squishing.

Using a light on its antenna, BB-8 spelled something out in morse code. <K-N-O-C-K K-N-O-C-K>

“Who’s there?” Poe whispered, knowing BB-8 could hear him.

<G-O T-H-E F-U-C-K T-O S-L-E-E-P.>

“Go the fuck to sleep who?” BB-8 rolled its optical lens. It was much more of a bratty teenager than Poe had ever been. “That’s a bad joke, BB.” But Poe, being the good pilot that he was, followed his orders. He trusted BB-8 to stand on watch.

He wrapped himself up in the circle of Finn’s arms, matched his breathing to the rhythm of Rey’s snores, and fell asleep.

**Author's Note:**

> I am also [on tumblr](http://hoosierbitch.tumblr.com/)!


End file.
